Evan – Chapter 2 – User of control magic

User of control magic

Evan walked out of his room immediately after getting up from the bed.

“Evan-sama! You’re supposed to keep resting――”

“It’s ok Sera. You see, for men, the hair is a very important thing. It is fleeting and ephemeral, but it also represents dignity in itself. And since that was deprived from me by a violent fool, so was my dignity as a man. Therefore, I must take it back!”

“Is-is that so?”

“That’s right.”

“I understand! Let me participate too, in the match for the sake of Evan-sama’s hair!

Serafina declared in high spirits. But I get the feeling she’s misinterpreting the meaning of my words.

She cutely trembled with shyness after I corrected her.

“But… I think, even though Evan-sama’s hair won’t grow back, it still looks wonderful.”

“…Oh, ok. Thanks. But still, don’t go saying those kinds of things.”

“I understand! I won’t go around telling people about the spot where Evan-sama’s hair won’t grow back!”

“We still don’t know for sure it won’t grow back!”

As Evan was talking about silly things, the anger and grieve he felt moments ago seemed like a lie, he also didn’t care about the new memories.
Instead, what was slightly hurt were his feelings.

After leaving the room, there were unnecessary long corridors. The Douglas family used to have a very decent income. But lately, that income had fallen down, to a point where some properties have needed to be sold.

But that was of no importance to him. He basically lived away from his parents, that way they didn’t have to see his face. And since he would eventually leave the house, this much meant nothing to him.

Since they lived by an inheritance system, only the eldest had the right to inherit the household, the same as with all the nobles, the second son could still stay at the house as a spare, but the living standards go down a lot when compared with the eldest son. But when the eldest son had his first son, that was the end of it.

Even if you don’t agree with it, you would have no choice but to leave home. And with the third son, and fourth son, this tendency only becomes stronger.

Obviously, parents just don’t kick you out. They make sure you get enough education and culture to find a profession by having a knight or a mage (TLN: mahoutsukai) as a personal tutor.

But for Evan, that was not the case. All because since he was born, he was disliked by his parents.

Only he had the power to protect himself. This world was far more dangerous than the previous world. Even if one tried to live peacefully, everything would end if you get attacked by a monster. Thieves and robbery was a common thing, and murder and betrayal happened on a daily basis.

To escape from all that, you could only trust in your own strength.

Evan immediately started thinking on which knowledge could be applied. However, since he was judged to have no real talent for magic, he never really did much training, and had polished nothing but his sword skills. So obviously, his knowledge in magic was little to none.

When people reach fifteen, they are considered as adults. I only have until then, so I really need to do something.

While having those thoughts, he walked outside. The main residence could be seen a little away, but everything was normal indicating there were no changes. Some maids were watering the flowers and some other servants were caring for the horses. But none of them even cared to notice Evan.

I never liked being mocked and bullied by my siblings, but now that no longer matters to me. All that matters is that I have Serafina by my side.

He walked over to an open space, and started practicing magic right away. Serafina silently watched as she went with him.

Magic could be broadly divided into four main groups. Creation magic that creates materials, Force magic which gives direction and power, Space-Time magic, that modifies time and space, and Control magic which as the name implies, controls the other three groups.

However, it is common knowledge that control magic is not widely used. The reason for that, there is not a person who excels at it, even a little, the control magic theory is not very developed either, and lastly, it does not affect the power of magic directly.

But that, in the future, might be the key to strength itself.

To activate magic, there is one main thing to consider. Let’s say this world is the real world, the “front”, there is another world made up from magic, a magic world called the “reverse”.

In that magical world, a virtual body is created, which corresponds to the physical body of the real world. Or in other words, it is something similar to a processing device for performing the arithmetic processing of the magic world.

It is a sort of process where instructions are issued from the virtual body, therefore activating the magic.

Evan began with the first step. Delimiting the area 1 meter around him, the magic field (TLN: 侵食領域 = erosion/encroachment area, but I used the same term as the manga translation, opinions?). That was the area in which the real world, and the magic world were connected. Within that range, it was possible to bring the influence of the magic world into the real world.

He then proceeded to the second step, create a command in the magic world. For now, he decided on just 『combustion』, which was an element of creation magic, to be activated.

Then, the process was completed as a third step, and the magic was activated for a while.

A flame about as big as a match’s then burned about fifty centimeters in front of Evan, but it fell down and disappeared soon after.

So far, it’s not that difficult of a skill. The main elements to be analyzed are those factors of the creation magic, such as 『combustion』. But this is a simple technique that pretty much everyone who learns magic can use right from the beginning.

Evan then reconfigured the command while maintaining the magic field. It was the same 『combustion』 instruction from the creation magic, and 『augmentation』(TLN: read as increase power/force) from force magic. If one added control magic to 『augmentation』it could be given a direction. So, when these elements were configured as a continuum, it could be called a circuit.

With the process completed, the flame activated by 『combustion』was given a directional force by 『augmentation』.

The flame was strengthened to be as big as a couple tens of centimeters, but as soon as it went outside of the magic field, it lost all the external forces on it, therefore drawing a parabola in the air as it fell down to the ground.

Because that magic circuit only connected the processes in a linear manner, everyone other than untalented people could do it. If one wasn’t able to accomplish this, he couldn’t call himself as a person able to use magic.

It was almost a useless of an attack if you could not create something with creation magic and add enough power to it with force magic in order to hit the enemy.

Evan sank in deep thought for a while. First, I should add a simple ON/OFF instruction. This was to control the magic in a way that if it exceeded a certain criterion it would turn on and if it went below it, it would turn off. This was a very useful approach for understanding the concept of control magic, regardless of whether it could actually be used.

Well then, what should I do…

Let’s say I want to make the flame stop at a certain position. In order to accomplish that, it is necessary to apply an upward force when it falls a certain height, and stop applying it when it exceeds it.

If that’s the case, then a sort of sensor for knowing the position of the flame is required.

Also, if I consider eliminating the error, it becomes necessary to take into account the current acceleration and movement of the sensor. It could be calculated by finding it from the positional data, but it might prove impossible to use it right away, since it uses such concepts as differentiating circuits.

I guess position sensors will have to do for now.

As it was already known that control magic encompasses elements such as observation and control, it was not that difficult of a task, so he tried to configure it immediately. The height is the position right in front of me.

He used『combustion』and『augmentation』to construct a loop, then he set it to discern the position at each time. And finally, he activated the magic.

The flame created repeatedly went up and down in height in front if his eyes. But it could be closer to saying that it was shaking instead of it being floating still.

“Evan-sama! Is that the knowledge you talked about!?”

“Well, it’s something from that place.”

“Amazing! This is the first time I see this kind of magic!”

But, the flame does not stay at the targeted position, and it moves up and down so much. This might not be usable.

But this is just the result of a single day of practice, it might not be bad after all, let’s stop here.

Evan released the magic field. He had only a small amount of magic power, and simply by using this little magic, it was already nearly depleted.

“Sera, let’s go back, its almost time to eat.”

“Yes! I will go and prepare it right away!”

Although it’s still a bit early, I haven’t eaten anything since this morning. My stomach is completely empty.